Ducks will be fine.-Gildon had replaced her as 1st big off
by Domerduck (2018-05-05 11:05:26)

In reply to: McGwire Now 4th Duck To Leave Oregon WBB Program  posted by dillon77

Post Reply Return to McGraw's Bench

the bench in the NCAA's and the 6-3 younger Sabally recruit is supposed to be better than Sabou, her older sister, who displaced Malory in the starting line-up this past year as a Freshman. They also still have 6'6" Giomi who was injured 2nd half of last year.

Mallory's decision is about playing time which was only going to get worst for her this coming year. As a Freshman she made 24 starts for the Ducks and started every NCAA Tourney game averaging 23,5 mpg as the Ducks were the only NCAA tourney team having 3 Freshman starters. She also was a starter at the beginning of this season until Sabou took her place and then also started when Lexi was hurt, making 19 total starts in 34 games prior to the NCAAs, avg 16.1 mpg. In the NCAA's she dropped to 10.7 while Oti Gildon increased her minutes to 14.3 as the 1st off the bench. Her production per minute was also down from the regular season while Oti improved her tourney production (just as she did the previous year during the big tourney wins against Duke & Maryland).

Still Mallory was a big contributor these past two seasons for the Ducks but she will need lots of playing time for her to keep developing if she wants to play in the WNBA, which it seems she does. At 6-5 and her talent she will definitely be a big contributer to BSU and certainly is a landing space that really doesn't compete against the ducks. I wish her well there.

As for next year Gildon as a senior will be big. Oti played with Sabrina, Ruthy, and Erin in the dominating 3 by 3 championship they had beating Arike's all star team as well as any other college teams assembled. (see ESPN article). This is her second year competing in the 3x3 as last year, teaming with Hebard, Justine Hall and Lexi Bando (who were both seniors this year) finished in second place in the same tournament. Oti steps it up in the big games as well as we saw in both sweet 16 games the past 2 years where she score 10.5 pts with 8 rebounds in just 23.5 minutes. She even had 4 steals against Maryland.

The wild card will be how good Nyara Sabally will be as well Ariizona POY Chavez and how they will fit into the team. Clearly Mallory's loss is the biggest of all the transfers, but there is still enough talent for the Ducks to win the PAC12 again and make a long run in the NCAAs. The starting 5 will be better with Boley replacing Bando and Gildon will lead 5 scholarship players coming off the bench who can all play. That's 3 more than ND's last NC championship team. I still am hoping for an ND/Oregon championship game.




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